Overwhelmed
by NostalgiaKick
Summary: Even superheroes get overwhelmed.


Author's note: This is set mid-season 2, before TOGOM.

Disclaimer: All recognisable characters, plot lines etc. are property of DC Comics, Warner Bros and December 3rd Productions. I own nothing.

* * *

It's been a bad day.

A day filled with rescue after rescue; car accidents, a woman falling off a bridge, a fire, robberies, all the day to day things that occur in a city the size of Metropolis.

And a plane crash.

More often than not, I'm the first one on the scene; an untrained first responder with some extra skills up my sleeve. I do what I can to help, to get people out of immediate danger, and leave the more technical things to the experts.

But there's one difference. After a particularly difficult incident, the experts get trauma counselling.

There are no support systems for volunteer superheroes.

I have my parents. Wonderful as they are, there are limits to what I can tell them. I know they worry, and the truth of some of the things I've seen would compound that worry tenfold. Besides, how can I put some of the heartache and destruction I've seen into words? And as painful as it is to contemplate- they are the only people that know the real Clark Kent- one day, they'll be gone.

Who will I turn to then?

I need someone else. Someone I can talk to. Someone who cares. Someone I can trust to help shoulder the wonderful and terrible burden that is my secret.

I need Lois.

The compulsion to tell her has been growing steadily for months; growing alongside my love for her. I've thought about it, dreamed about it, planned it… and rejected it. My concern that she'll plaster it all over the front page of the Planet has become a convenient fiction. The truth is, I'm scared. Not of how she'll react- though that worries me a little- but scared of taking that step. Of letting someone in, closer than any other human on the planet. Because Lois will put it all together. She'll piece together my behaviour as Clark and the times I couldn't resist visiting her as Superman, and she'll know how much I care about her. How much I love her. Both of my secrets in one slender woman's hands.

It's the one thing that's been stopping me.

But today…

Today I need someone to talk to.

I need someone to help me blank out the horrors of that plane crash. To help diminish the impact of the broken bodies strewn across the hillside. To help stop the nightmares from coming.

My parents are taking a well-deserved vacation, and while I could probably find their cruise ship in the middle of the South Pacific, it would give rise to the kind of speculation I've tried to avoid as Superman.

It's time.

I take a deep breath and let myself dip out of the holding pattern I've been flying over the city, changing trajectory partway across town to collect pizza. In my experience, Lois reacts better when she's been fed.

I knock on the door, balancing the bottle of Lois's favourite cream soda on top of the pizza box I'd picked up from her favourite pizzeria in an attempt to soften her up.

Lois swings the door open. She's clearly ready to settle in for the night, dressed in sweats rather than her usual stylish business suit; still, she smiles, clearly happy to see me- something that warms my heart.

"Clark!"

She ushers me in, making herself busy finding plates and glasses before we settle on her uncomfortable sofa with the pizza open in front of us on the coffee table.

"Where'd you get to today? I looked up and you were gone."

"Sorry. I got… caught up." It's the truth but not the whole truth; something that I am so sick of. I'm sick of lying to her by omission, of constructing excuses on the spur of the moment that sound ridiculous even to me. And for a second the words come to the tip of my tongue; I swallow them back, wanting to let her eat before I spring something so huge on her.

We eat, and I try to keep an ear on the conversation and make appropriate responses, but my mind is elsewhere, trying to decide whether to tell her the truth. I'm obliquely aware that I should be nervous, that one small sentence will change my life forever, but in truth, I'm spent. Emotionally and mentally exhausted from the strain of the day, from not hearing the plane before it ploughed into that hillside, from spending hours trying vainly to find one single heartbeat in the shrapnel that was once an aircraft. I don't even realise that I've lapsed into silence until her voice breaks it.

"Mind if I turn on the news?"

I want to say no, that I've had enough of pain and death and destruction, but the words stick in my throat, and before I know it I'm looking once again at the broken bodies on the hillside, the shattered remains of what had once been a multimillion-dollar aeroplane, my Suit an incongruous bright spot against the wreckage as I dive, again and again, frantically searching for survivors. I must have made a sound because suddenly she's looking at me with an expression of mingled curiosity and concern. I wave one hand futilely, rendered speechless at coming face to face with that scene again and close my eyes, trying to ward off the flood of images. I feel a touch on my knees and she's kneeling in front of me, her brow furrowed with worry.

"Clark? What is it?"

Too emotionally drained to speak, to embark on the kind of explanation needed right now, I lift my hand and fumble the buttons of my shirt open, laying bare the emblem on my chest, still stained and dirty and stinking of jet fuel and death. Her eyes widen and I know she understands what I'm trying to tell her; that she knows I'm Superman. We stay frozen for a long moment, me barely daring to breathe; I cannot handle any more negative emotion tonight. Not tonight.

"Oh, Clark," she murmurs. "You poor man."

Her arms go around me, and I shudder with relief, with reaction. She might be angry later, but right now she's being exactly what I need her to be.

A friend.


End file.
